O Lord - How Long?

To steal the infamous line of D.A. Carson's excellent book on suffering, How Long, O Lord?, "All you have to do is live long enough, and you will suffer." How true that is. In this life, you will suffer. Therefore, the question is not if we will suffer, but when will we suffer. When your day or week or year or life of suffering comes, I pray you would take counsel from the sufferings of King David.

O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger,
nor discipline me in your wrath.
Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing;
heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled.
My soul also is greatly troubled.
But you, O Lord - how long?

Turn, O Lord, deliver my life;
save me for the sake of your steadfast love.
For in death there is no remembrance of you;
in Sheol who will give you praise?

I am weary with my moaning;
every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with weeping.
My eye wastes away because of grief;
it grows weak because of all my foes.

Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.
The Lord has heard my plea;
the Lord accepts my prayer.
All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled;
they shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment.

- Psalm 6

God hears your cries for help. He hears your pleas for mercy. Now hear this: He accepts your prayer. And because he accepted your prayer, your enemy of sin, Satan, cancer, Alzheimers, abuse, and death shall be ashamed and greatly troubled and shall turn back and be put to shame because Christ has overcome the world. Through His life, death, and resurrection, God's holy wrath is satisfied, and we will be taken to a place where "He will wipe away every tear from [our] eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore" (Rev 21:4).

So, when your day of suffering comes - if it is not already here - and you find yourself asking, "O Lord, how long?" I imagine Jesus might reply, "Surely, I am coming soon" (Rev 22:20).

Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!